Video might have killed the radio star according to the 1979 hit, but will high-speed broadband kill the video store?

The answer is "not just yet", if you believe the optimistic line from the video rental industry.

In the short to medium term, confusion over how to build a world-class national broadband network and what technology to use seems to be keeping the traditional video store on life support.

But the co-owner of Australia's biggest video store chain believes the demise of the video store is being exaggerated.

Paul Uniacke, co-owner of the Franchise Media Group which operates the Blockbuster and Video Ezy chains in Australia and New Zealand, says anecdotal evidence does not stack up with reality.

"We've been, as an industry, wiped off for the last 15, 16 years and, at the moment with a lot of talk around the national broadband network, we seem to have a flourish of that type of talk again at the moment," he told the ABC's AM program.

"The reality is the industry is flourishing and is as busy as it's ever been, more profitable than it's ever been, and renting more movies than in its 32-year history."

Mr Uniacke cites a recent report that shows that, over the past six years, video stores have recorded year on year increased income, with the average customer spend per transaction up 17 per cent.

The figures also show that in 2009 more than 180 million movies were rented in Australia and more than 76 million DVDs were sold.

"Through diversifying our products to include DVD and TV on DVD sales, video game sales, phone sales and recharges as well as confectionary, video rental stores are in fact thriving and successful businesses," Mr Uniacke said.

"The other major factor in the continued success of the video rental industry is that higher quality formats such as Blu-ray high definition video and 3D are difficult to distribute electronically. Unlike music downloads, 3D movie files can be up to 40GB in size and can take up to one day to download.

"Most people would rather rent the movie than go through that process."

Mr Uniacke believes faster broadband will ultimately mean faster downloads, but even with a national broadband network, download speeds might not be sufficient for 3D films.

"James Cameron is playing with Avatar to try to get it released on 3D. He's a bit nervous because the disk size is over 60 gigabytes," Mr Uniacke said.

"He held back Avatar five years because the technology didn't exist to make the movie he wanted. Now he can't find a disk size that's big enough to put the 3D on.

"He will make bigger movies in the future and they will not be downloaded in the quality he wants them in so they will be purchased as packaged media."

However, a report by accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers signals the video store will eventually need to adapt to new technologies such as high-speed broadband.

In its annual Media and Entertainment Outlook, PWC says "poor internet infrastructure and burdensome download limits are extending the life of the DVD rental market".